If you have ever applied for a credit card, loan, or mortgage, you are likely familiar with credit inquiries, or someone “running your credit”. While you might understand the outcome of the inquiry and the meaning of your overall score, you may not be aware of the different types of inquiries, as well as what’s included on your credit report.
So, what’s on my credit report?
Your credit report includes all current and past credit accounts you hold or have held. This also details your payment history, along with any late payments that are made 30, 60, and 90 days past their due dates. Additionally, your current account balances and credit limits will be included in the inquiry.
What’s a Credit Inquiry?
Put simply, a credit inquiry is any time you or a 3rd party look at your credit report. Depending on the type of inquiry that is made, your overall score could be affected. For this reason, it is important to know what makes the two types of inquiries different, and more importantly, how they can affect your credit score. Let’s break it down below!
Soft Inquiries:
The most frequent and least consequential. The most common example; If you have ever received a prequalification letter from a credit card, then you have had a soft inquiry run on your credit report. This type of inquiry does not require written consent, unlike hard inquiries, and has no impact on your credit score. Although your score will not be affected, remember that these inquiries will still appear on your report.
Hard Inquiries:
Hard inquiries are typically less frequent as they occur when you apply for a loan, credit card, or mortgage and you’ve provided written consent to a creditor to check your scores.
What do hard inquiries on your report say to lenders?
Many consecutive hard inquiries for credit cards can negatively impact your score and potentially give lenders that impression that you’re facing financial challenges. If you have multiple hard inquiries in a row from auto, mortgage or student loan lenders are less likely to have a negative impact, as reporting agencies may assume you are “rate shopping” and the multiple inquiries are viewed as a single inquiry.
Hard inquiries will stop impacting your score in about a year, but like soft inquiries, will stay on your report. While both types of inquiries play a part in the assessment of your overall credit, they only account for ~10% of your score.
A lot of clients ask me to come view their property and give them advice on getting their property ready for showings and the open house. Generally we go through the process of picking and choosing how to best stage and declutter their home. After years of living in a house, things tend to pile up – and we all are attached to our favorite random items that might not mean anything to someone else.
Many times however, a seller has already emptied the home in order to move into their next property. This leaves the property vacant which can be hit or miss for photography and showings. 85% of Potential Buyers report that photos are the most important reason for them deciding to visit a home. Many sellers opt to stage a property via a professional staging company which is not only an additional out of pocket expense, but can run thousands of dollars for the seller. I am a huge fan of staging and think it is certainly worth the money if the seller is capable of spending the additional cash to get their home looking its best. Creating the right feel for buyers is so important and staging can bring new life to a home.
But what does a seller do if they don’t have thousands of dollars to spend on professional staging?
A cost effective alternative for traditional staging is virtual staging! We cover the cost of virtual staging for all of our sellers as an additional bonus to listing with us. Virtual staging can really provide that perfect FIRST IMPRESSION to buyers who are browsing photos in order to choose which open houses they will attend.
Here are some examples of virtual staging:
Virtually Staged Living room Virtually Staged Kitchen
Excited to announce we received this award! Thank you to all of our clients for your continued support!
A Realty Group Receives 2018 Best of Quincy Award
Quincy Award Program Honors the Achievement
QUINCY October 25, 2018 — 3A Realty Group has been selected for the 2018 Best of Quincy Award in the Real Estate Brokers category by the Quincy Award Program.
Each year, the Quincy Award Program identifies companies that we believe have achieved exceptional marketing success in their local community and business category. These are local companies that enhance the positive image of small business through service to their customers and our community. These exceptional companies help make the Quincy area a great place to live, work and play.
Various sources of information were gathered and analyzed to choose the winners in each category. The 2018 Quincy Award Program focuses on quality, not quantity. Winners are determined based on the information gathered both internally by the Quincy Award Program and data provided by third parties.
About Quincy Award Program
The Quincy Award Program is an annual awards program honoring the achievements and accomplishments of local businesses throughout the Quincy area. Recognition is given to those companies that have shown the ability to use their best practices and implemented programs to generate competitive advantages and long-term value.
The Quincy Award Program was established to recognize the best of local businesses in our community. Our organization works exclusively with local business owners, trade groups, professional associations and other business advertising and marketing groups. Our mission is to recognize the small business community’s contributions to the U.S. economy.
